1. Field of the Invention
The invention generally relates to a sheets-separating module and a multifunction printer using the same, and more particularly, to a sheets-separating module and a multifunction printer using the same which have stable sheets-separating effect and are not easy to get paper jams.
2. Description of Related Art
Along with the developments of science and technology and interconnected social network, various electronic and electric products have become indispensable tools for daily life. For example, during working in an office, common office equipments including computer, printer, fax machine, photocopier and the like are indispensable, in which the operation efficiency of equipments using paper sheets such as printer, photocopier and fax machine would be affected by the paper-feeding function thereof.
Taking a multifunction printer with both photocopy and printing functions as an example, an automatic paper-feeding device is disposed on the multifunction printer to drive the carried blank paper sheets entering into the multifunction printer for printing operation. Prior to printing, a user needs to place some paper sheets on the paper-feeding device (for example, a sheets-bearing tray). Then, during printing, an employed paper-feeding device conveys the paper sheets in the multifunction printer so that a printing device forms images on a paper sheet.
FIG. 1 is a partial schematic diagram of a conventional multifunction printer and FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of the sheets-separating module of FIG. 1. Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2, there is a bottom board 101 in the multifunction printer 100 for bearing paper sheets. A plurality of rollers 150 are disposed over the bottom board 101 for driving the paper sheets to move forward; meanwhile, a sheets-separating module 103 disposed on the bottom board 101 separates the paper sheets one by one.
In more details, an elastic element 103a of the sheets-separating module 103 is a cantilever, and the width and the thickness of the elastic element are the same from a connection end 103b to a free end 103c. With the above-mentioned structure design, the sheets-separating module 103 is very easy to be affected by the number of the paper sheets in the sheets-bearing tray. Moreover, since the connection end 103b connects a body 103d of the sheets-separating module 103, so that the stiffness of the connection end 103b is larger than the stiffness of the free end 103c. During conveying the paper sheets 105, although the forces applied by the paper sheets 105 at the connection end 103b and the free end 103c are the same as each other, the deformation of the connection end 103b is less than the deformation of the free end 103c. On the other hand, when the paper sheets borne in the sheets-bearing tray are fewer, a larger force is needed to make the elastic element 103a of the sheets-separating module to deform, so that the leading edges of the paper sheets 105 are easily damaged.